1. Field of the invention
The present invention concerns a system comprising a spatial mother probe forming a spatial carrier vehicle, and a plurality of spatial daughter probes and the assembly of said spatial daughter probes on the spatial mother probe forming the spatial carrier vehicle.
The technical field of the present invention is the spatial field, and notably spatial missions for taking away several probes that are to be released from a unique spatial carrier vehicle.
2. Description of the Related Art
The question of releasing several satellites from a single launcher is already known, and notably documents U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,152,482, 5,605,308, 5,199,672 and 5,271,582 concern assemblies whereby launchers are equipped with satellite clusters set around a longitudinal axis of the launcher.
Said assemblies, adapted to a rapid release of multiple satellites, are not adapted for the release of spatial probes due to the fact that major trajectory corrections of the carrier vehicle would be necessary in terms of direction and angular rotation around the longitudinal axis in order to release such probes.
Document U.S. Pat. No. 5,350,137, on its part, simplifies the assembly of satellites on a launcher, since it provides for satellites having a paraboloid-shaped structure supporting auxiliary equipment, the paraboloid-shaped structure of the satellites enabling to pile them up, one on top of the other, according to a longitudinal axis of the launcher beneath a separable cap.
Document U.S. Pat. No. 5,765,784 describes, on its part, a spatial carrier vehicle on which are hung clusters of daughter probes.
The daughter probes or landing modules are placed around the carrier vehicle and, by consequence, have distinct directions of relative separation, which induce a variation in the system's symmetry during the release operations.
In this case, it is necessary to modify the attitude of the spatial carrier vehicle prior to each separation in order to correctly orientate each descending module.
Additionally, this type of configuration not only requires a complex structure as regards the carrier vehicle, but the carrier vehicle/probe assembly is of significant diameter. Moreover, the symmetry variations of the system not only complicates the procedure as the release process goes on, but also increase the quantity of fuel required and the mass of the launcher.